Environmental group takes out ads urging Obama to protect Everglades

May 10, 2011|David Fleshler

Full page ads ran today in The Washington Post, CQ and Roll Call urging President Obama to give the federal government a more active role in protecting the Everglades, citing the failure of the state of Florida to do so.

“Our water supply continues to shrink, America’s Everglades continue to die,” states the ad from the Everglades Foundation. “President Obama: Now is the time to lead.”

The ads were prompted by a decision by U.S. District Judge Alan Gold two weeks ago to give greater authority to the federal government in issuing water permits, in order to stop polluted water from washing into the Everglades.

Gold found that both the state and the South Florida Water Management District, which leads Everglades restoration, "have not been true stewards of protecting the Everglades in recent years."

The ad calls on the president to establish a stronger, high-level federal role in Everglades restoration, instruct the Department of Agriculture to buy land to protect the Everglades’ water sources, tell the Environmental Protection Agency to take a hard line on water quality standards, fund critical restoration projects and end subsidies to the sugar industry.

"For too long, in defiance of our state’s Constitution, Big Sugar and the state’s other chronic polluters have lobbied and litigated to delay the cleanup of fertilizer and hazardous toxins they spew into the Everglades and our water," the ad states. "While BP is paying 100% of the cost of cleaning up their oil spill, Big Sugar has successfully pushed the cost of cleaning up their pollution onto the taxpayers!"